The longer the race, the stronger Nina Brenn becomes. The successful multi-athlete and mother still works 50% as a forest engineer and keeps on surprising us year after year with her outstanding performances at multi-sport events.

Your successes are simply fantastic, considering that the sport «only» takes third priority after your family and work. In your opinion, what are the 3 most important factors that led to these successes and enabled you to develop your performance level?

• Training: I am a person who loves to exercise, so I do endurance and multi-sports out of sheer joy. It gives me great satisfaction and balance, which is why I do sports practically every day. It goes without saying that I have developed an incredibly good base (and without any wear and tear either!) over the past almost 20 years.
• Physical condition: I have a certain talent for multi-sports, am relatively good in all disciplines, and have a robust body.
• Mindset: I don’t race to win, but simply aim to make it the best race for me on the day. Mentally, this gives me great composure and a relaxed attitude. But of course, it is also a great feeling to win a race. At the Duathlon World Championships in Copenhagen, I realised on the 2nd running leg that I could win this race. And then I was prepared to really fight for it. But if I hadn’t managed to win, my life would have continued just the same :-)

Training and recovery belong together. How do you organise yourself so that neither one nor the other comes off badly?

My recovery tends to come off badly, or rather, had I more time, then I would use it for recovery. Basically, work (office or construction site control) means recovery for me. Then my head does the work :-)

And since I know my body very well by now, I can also spontaneously miss out a few training sessions when I realize that it is all getting too much.

There is a lot of time to think during your long races. What runs through your head? How do you respond to any negative thoughts that pop up?

During long races I mainly concentrate on myself and my body, that is to say, I constantly listen to my needs with regards to my speed, whether I need to drink or eat, and basically focus on the road. And I also absorb a great many impressions from the surroundings. The Inferno Triathlons and Gigathlons in particular have a lot to offer when it comes to scenic landscapes. I simply push negative thoughts (such as I don’t want to, my legs are tired, etc.) to the side. You shouldn’t allow yourself to think that you actually don’t want to any more and that giving up would be so much easier (it doesn’t bode well). I then try to shift down a gear until "the crisis" is over, after which I pick up my pace again.

Many athletes have the once-in-a-lifetime goal of competing in a multi-sports event such as the Inferno Triathlon. What are your three most important tips to make such a challenge possible?

• Training: You need it anyway :-) me too!
• Speed: It is very important that you start the race at a rather moderate pace. The day is so long, you can always pick up the pace towards the end.
• Mindset: Set small intermediate targets: when I start swimming during the Inferno, I don’t even think about the running leg. I divide the race into many small stages and only towards the end of “one small stage” do I start thinking about the next. When I am on the running leg of the Inferno, I only think until I get to Lauterbrunnen. And when I am in Lauterbrunnen, the next stage then takes me to the turn off onto the trail path. And the next stage after the trail path takes me to Mürren, and so on.

Foto: ZVG